Printable Tuba Fingering Chart
A free printable tuba fingering chart for the standard school instrument: the 3-valve B♭ tuba (the same fingerings serve the sousaphone). All 25 notes from B♭1 to B♭3 are charted with their valve combinations.
Download the PDFs
If you arrived looking for a tuba fingering chart pdf, this is it — and it is honest about its one limit, printed on the chart itself: four-valve fingerings are explained in a text panel, not mixed into the grid, so a three-valve player is never sent looking for a valve they do not have.
Both PDFs are free for classroom and personal use. Print them, copy them for your class, pin them on the wall — please just do not resell them or post them as your own product.
What is in the chart
The grid gives the three-valve fingering for every note, with the three published alternates marked (B2 with valve 3, C3 with 1+3, D3 with 1+2). The text panel gives the fourth-valve equivalents the chart page teaches: valve 4 replaces 1+3 for C2, and 2+4 replaces 1+2+3 for B1 — the two notes where a fourth valve genuinely changes the fingering in this range. The blank worksheet prints the same 25 diagrams empty for low-brass quizzes.
The full chart, online
Prefer to check a note on screen, hear it, or look up one fingering at a time? The tuba fingering chart has all of it — and every note below links to its own page with the diagram, the sound and the fingering in words.
| Note | Fingering |
|---|---|
| B♭1 | Open — no valves pressed at all. |
| B1 | Valves 1 + 2 + 3 pressed. |
| C2 | Valves 1 + 3 pressed. |
| D♭2 | Valves 2 + 3 pressed. |
| D2 | Valves 1 + 2 pressed. |
| E♭2 | Valve 1 pressed. |
| E2 | Valve 2 pressed. |
| F2 | Open — no valves pressed at all. |
| G♭2 | Valves 2 + 3 pressed. |
| G2 | Valves 1 + 2 pressed. |
| A♭2 | Valve 1 pressed. |
| A2 | Valve 2 pressed. |
| B♭2 | Open — no valves pressed at all. |
| B2 | Valves 1 + 2 pressed. Also usedValve 3 pressed. |
| C3 | Valve 1 pressed. Also usedValves 1 + 3 pressed. |
| D♭3 | Valve 2 pressed. |
| D3 | Open — no valves pressed at all. Also usedValves 1 + 2 pressed. |
| E♭3 | Valve 1 pressed. |
| E3 | Valve 2 pressed. |
| F3 | Open — no valves pressed at all. |
| G♭3 | Valves 2 + 3 pressed. |
| G3 | Valves 1 + 2 pressed. |
| A♭3 | Valve 1 pressed. |
| A3 | Valve 2 pressed. |
| B♭3 | Open — no valves pressed at all. |
Printing tips
Print the filled chart for the tuba stand and keep the fourth-valve panel in view if your section mixes three- and four-valve instruments — it ends the "why is yours different?" conversation in one reading. Blank worksheets work by register rows: the pedal-adjacent low notes first, where fingering confidence matters most. Black-and-white printing loses nothing.
Try a note in the Fingering Finder
Pick an instrument and a note and the diagram updates instantly — filled keys are the ones you press. The same finder sits on every note page, pre-set to that note.
Notes students check most
See also the tuba fingering chart and the printable fingering charts index for the other instruments.
Is the printable tuba fingering chart really free?
Yes — both PDFs are free for classroom and personal use, with no sign-up.
My tuba has four valves. Is this chart wrong for me?
The fingerings printed are the standard three-valve set, which four-valve players also use for most notes. The two notes where the fourth valve offers the standard alternative in this range — C2 and B1 — are explained in the panel on the printable and in full on the chart page.
Does the PDF match the online tuba chart?
Exactly — generated from the same data file, checked against Yamaha's official B♭ tuba chart and the NoteAtlas tuba chart; all 25 fingerings agree.